


Don't Let it Slip Away

by Merfilly



Category: DCU Animated
Genre: Episode Tag, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-01
Updated: 2007-12-01
Packaged: 2017-12-14 07:54:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,019
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/834497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Merfilly/pseuds/Merfilly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bruce and Clark find themselves after 'HereAfter'</p>
            </blockquote>





	Don't Let it Slip Away

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Toonverse: Romance. First time. Hopefully set during the Justice League episode "Hereafter", where Superman 'dies' and Batman does everything in his power to find him/save him.

Bruce didn't sleep the entire time.

Sleep would waste precious moments, moments that might be necessary to discover the truth, to find the man Bruce...

That line of thought was one more proof that the body's need for sleep was highly overrated, and Bruce needed to dedicate more research at his company to finding ways around it. What good was there in being a high-powered corporate man if he couldn't even make the company work for his mission?

“Master Bruce, I insist...”

Same timing as ever, Bruce noted. 

“No, Alfred. Leave the food, but I'm not coming upstairs.”

“As you'd have it, Master Bruce.” The chill in those proper words was tinged, only slightly, with an understanding toward the grief that drove his ward.

`~`~`~`~`

Clark tossed and turned one more time in the bed. Now that he had found Vandal, who was actually good company, if only out of sheer boredom and ennui, he had no goal, no driving mission merely to survive. Vandal seemed so certain there was no way to reverse this, to get him back and correct the time stream.

That meant never saying things that had needed saying. Never finding out if there had ever been more there than simple camaraderie. Never knowing just what it was to kiss a man who hid behind a cowl.

With a frustrated growl, Clark threw the sheet off, and rose to stalk out of the room and apply his brain, since his fists were of no use right now.

`~`~`~`~`

One day, Bruce might be annoyed that it was Deadshot that nearly killed him. One day he might actually care that he had almost died, his mission unfinished.

That day was not going to be anytime soon, as Bruce kept finding himself staring after the Kryptonian. The man he had been so sure was not dead had proven him right.

So why, watching as things fell back into old patterns, did Bruce feel like there was something still missing? Why, when he gave himself to sleep's embrace, could he not uncurl his hand from that tiny scrap of cape he still had?

`~`~`~`~`

Clark kissed Lois's cheek, as he saw her to her door. Both of them felt the perfunctory manner of it, and an awkward silence fell where she once would have invited him in.

“Nearly dying changes people,” she said softly.

“But I didn't...” came the immediate protest.

“I thought you had. And now, we're two different people than we were,” Lois told him. “Smallville, I think we need to admit this...just isn't going to work.” She tip-toed up, kissing his cheek in turn. “Good luck, Clark...with whomever you find.” When those words gave him visions of gray and black, with two piercing spots of blue, he turned quickly from her, letting her believe he was hurt by this rather than show the flush of desire.

`~`~`~`~`

Bruce looked up as Clark approached him, noting they were the last two people on the Watchtower in light of it being the holidays. Some were dispatched to deal with trouble; others were with loved ones. Bruce had volunteered to take Monitor Duty to free up others, and let Alfred hold the holiday celebration a day early. Why Clark was here when he had parents to see was a minor mystery, but one put on hold as the other man pulled forward a card.

“It's an invitation,” Clark said, oddly nervous. “I have to go, but I wanted to give it to you now.” He hesitated before moving on, to go to his own holiday meal. “Happy Thanksgiving, Bruce.”

“To you and your parents,” Bruce responded, waiting for the man to go. He then carefully unsealed the envelope, pulling an elegantly penned card out to read. 

“Please meet me tomorrow, the first place I saw you in Gotham, after your patrol.” It was signed 'S' instead of 'C', which told Bruce just which meeting he meant.

`~`~`~`~`

Batman was scowling. The thought struck Clark palpably. He almost called over the comm to say he was not going to be able to make it.

Then he remembered that Batman always seemed to scowl. At least at him. And their teammates. When he did smile, it often frightened the other League members. Wally even said a Bat-smile was enough to terrify his Rogues.

It was enough to make Clark come closer and land, settling as lightly as he could on the roof.

“You wanted to meet me?”

Clark swallowed as he nodded, even though Bruce's back was to him, his eyes scanning the city. “There are...things I want to talk about.” That made the other man turn, looking at him with interest. Behind those white-lenses, blue eyes could be showing anything, but Clark could not bring himself to try and gage Bruce that way. 

“Oh?”

“When I was gone,” Clark began, wondering why that made Bruce's jaw tighten so hard. “I had to do a lot of thinking. I might not have been dead, but I was in a place where I doubted if I would ever see any of you again.”

“If you need counseling, J'onn is a better priest,” Bruce said, in a growling tone. He didn't want to admit he had gone through the same thing, every moment that his mind and body had been forced to be still in his drive to get Clark home.

“I don't need a priest...I need you.”

The admission came without the careful polish, without thought, without anything but truth.

Both men looked at one another, those words trapped in the air between them, unable to be called back.

Clark waited, seeing every muscle shift in the man across from him, until Bruce just moved bringing them eye to eye.

“Need?”

In answer to that, Clark leaned forward, watching now for evasion and finding none, before his lips met those that were naked beneath the line of the cowl.

The first kiss, of an opportunity that was not to be let slip by.

That it would be the first of many would be for time to show the Skeptic and the Innocent.


End file.
